mycanonphotos said:
Here is another done about the same time frame...one of my favorites..Again in print its amazing as well..
this is how I saw the scene in my head before I shot it...going with a more "Natural" look woud have not done it justice in my opinion..
Technically speaking, and not to be callous, but this isn't HDR. It is actually the result of improper tonemapping during conversion from HDR (which in the truest sense is an image that stores 32-bit floating point values for each RGB subpixel) to a lower integer bit depth (such as 16-bit or 8-bit). It is the use of high precision 32-bit floating point numbers that makes things "high" dynamic range.
This "classic" HDR "look" is effectively the result of a mistake, or a mistaken understanding of proper HDR processing when converting from "HDR" to "LDR". It is entirely fine if you are purposely doing this for the sake of art...but just to be correct here, calling it HDR is technically incorrect. The images here actually have very low contrast, and therefor very low dynamic range.
High Dynamic Range means exactly that. That the
actual data in the image contains enough precision and information to
represent a
high dynamic range.
Personally, I find these kind of "HDR" images to be...well, not my kind of thing. They have issues all over the place that rub me the wrong way. They are relatively "flat"...no real contrast curve...and the lack of contrast actually means there is very little dynamic range in the results themselves. Terrible color in the bright sun highlights is common...I mean, it this case it turns PINK because of the processing. Unusual and unnatural color gradients are common, not just in the bright highlights, but also in the shadows and around areas that would normally have higher contrast. Halos exist around all edges, kind of like a "glow". These kinds of images tend to have this "soft noise" effect to them, which just feels a little weird.
From an artsy standpoint, these kinds of images certainly have artistic flare. I have no problem with people being artistic, and if this look is your artistic goal, more power to you! I just wish we could stop calling it HDR. It really isn't.